swords in the news

Here's another good one... I suppose a majority of the sword stories will be from the UK:

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/tyne/6251079.stm

"Police hunting mystery swordsman
Police on Tyneside are seeking a man carrying a sword who came to the aid of plain clothes officers during a burglary attempt.

"The officers were threatened by a man with a knife after they discovered armed men trying to break into a house in Laygate, South Shields.

"Another man armed with a samurai sword appeared and attacked the man with the knife, before leaving the scene.

"Three men have been charged with aggravated burglary.

"One faces an additional charge of attempted wounding with intent to resist arrest."

Mad Dog wrote:

Black Barney wrote:

Are you legally allowed to kill someone who enters your house automatically in the United States?

You have to warn them away first, iirc.

I think you have to have cause to believe you or your family's life is actually in danger. If you shoot someone who breaks into your house but wasn't trying to kill you, you can be charged with all kinds of stuff. "Manslaughter" or "criminally negligent killing" if the intruder died, "unnecessary force" or some kind of assault charge if they lived.

Mad Dog wrote:

Black Barney wrote:

Are you legally allowed to kill someone who enters your house automatically in the United States?

You have to warn them away first, iirc.

I'm not a lawyer of any sort, but I do know this one depends a lot on where you live as some states have straight-out "Dirty Harry" laws--if you feel that your life *or property* are being threatened with immediate harm (and failure to heed a warning can be consituted as "immediate harm"), you have the right to defend yourself using any force necessary up to and including deadly force. The kicker becomes the degree of force used. If you shot the guy in the leg and he went down--thus removing the immediate threat--you're OK. If you then walked up and shot him in the head for good measure, you're likely going to jail/trial. If you just shot him in the head the first time, you're OK...

Virginia (home for me) and Texas are also both "concealed carry states" (meaning average citizens can carry concealed weapons with proper permits) and have fairly liberal laws for their use. TX is more liberal than VA but both give a lot of latitude when it comes to self-defense with a weapon. There seem to be stories out of Texas annually where random citizens have stopped their cars or have rushed out of their homes to help cops who were getting shot at after traffic stops return fire.

Semi-offtopic anecdote: There was a case around 1994 or '95 in Alexandria, VA, where some schmuck was holding up tourists at gunpoint. One day he jumps out of the alley and points his pistol--which subsequently turned out to be a spraypainted Airsoft--on 3 guys in suits. The 3 guys in questions were FBI agents on their way back from lunch, who promptly shot this guy 6 times in under 2 seconds. No charges filed.

yeah, up here kids get shot all the time when they point their laser pistols at cops. I guess that's just gonna happen.

Seems like its reasonable to just sword swipe the guy in the arm or leg and render them ineffective. That being said, I think if I had a gun and in the heat of the moment I'd probably just put two slugs in the dude's head without thinking it through (if I was a good marksman). I honestly think video games would be somewhat responsable for a knee-jerk reaction like that.


Anyway, interesting thread regardless.

I didn't know Detroit was the murder capital. I knew that it was the crime capital of North America but for violent stuff like murder, I had thought it was Baltimore and Washington DC. I read some crime statistics about the Detroit Bus Station and I laughed. It's absolutely insane the frequency of crime in that place.

Black Barney wrote:

I didn't know Detroit was the murder capital. I knew that it was the crime capital of North America but for violent stuff like murder, I had thought it was Baltimore and Washington DC. I read some crime statistics about the Detroit Bus Station and I laughed. It's absolutely insane the frequency of crime in that place.

The murder capital moves around. At one point, it was Miami. East Saint Louis put up some impressive stats in the '80s. But yeah, Detroit and DC are the usual winners. I'm surprised about Baltimore... maybe that's why they based that show Homicide there.

I havent' read a report on this in years. I know that Baltimore WAS the murder capital of North America for a while back then. I knew people in Baltimore that would warn me against walking more than a couple blocks from the city centre. They said it's insane how fast the city goes downhill just barely outside the city centre.

My mom has a house in Maryland not far from Baltimore and now lives in Florida. My wife is from upstate NY. I think if I ever had to live in the U.S. it would only be one of 3 places:

NYC
California
Connecticut

I would walk in downtown Baltimore long before Brooklyn, East LA, or downtown New Haven. You can get rolled for wearing a Red Sox shirt in the Bronx.

Baltimore had a high murder rate last year. To some extent it was over-inflated because they dumped statistics from late 2007 and early 2009 into the totals, but it was a unique year here.

Baltimore is getting a lot of reputation from The Wire, but what I've found amusing (I know both Prince George's and Baltimore police officers) is that The Wire showed criminal strategies that were not in common use in the area prior to it being televised. That expanded the difficulty of the police doing their job.

"City Center" Baltimore is presumably considered to be Harbor Place. You're likely in safe territory for ten blocks to the east into Fell's Point or Little Italy, both of which are NOT to be missed. Four or five blocks north of the harbor is pretty doggone safe, and around the harbor to Federal Hill west. Down in by McHenry the city has indeed gone to pot and north of Baltimore Street is a very depressed area, largely due to Baltimore's depopulation over the last fifty years. Half the size it was. The neighborhoods around Hopkins (much north of the harbor) where this crime occurred are well gentrified at this point, but heck, break-ins can happen anywhere. The guy I used to sail for made a killing refurbishing houses in that part of town about ten years back.

Sag.

I can smell the blue blood bleeding from sag's post. It's cool. Yeah, i was talking about Harbour place, I'm told that walking away from Harbour place is basically trouble in every direction except underwater.


Yeah the RedSox/NYY thing is nuts. I have zero interest in baseball but I wore a Yankee's cap on Martha's Vineyard once and the bus driver wouldn't let me on the bus unless I took my cap off.

Now I have a bunch of RedSox shirts because my family are all fans but I could give a rat's ass. I wear it cuz it's got a red shamrock on it and looks irish. I'm a Habs fan and that's it.

And up here (Montreal) we have an insane level of respect for fans of other hockey teams. I mean we'll spit on their emblems but it won't get violent. There's all these cool stories that Bruins' fans have from coming up to Montreal to see a game and engaging in cool conversation with rival fans during the game.

...fock, I'm really off topic. Umm... I think they should allow swords in hockey.

Here's another heart-warming tale of heroic swordplay:

www.justnews.com/news/13466229/detail.html

"Teen Scares Off Burglar With Samurai Sword"

Black Barney wrote:

I think they should allow swords in hockey.

Ice-skates do have blades on them. The hockey guys just need figure-skating lessons so they can roundhouse their opponents throats on the ice.

I have a kid. If some guy acts like he's planning on breaking into my house and going through me to do it, and I have a samurai sword... I have no moral qualms with stabbing the guy.

Mad Dog wrote:

Black Barney wrote:

I think they should allow swords in hockey.

Ice-skates do have blades on them. The hockey guys just need figure-skating lessons so they can roundhouse their opponents throats on the ice.

Billy Smith did this once. You gotta admit, the man had skills.

Sag.

screamingtruth wrote:

I have a kid. If some guy acts like he's planning on breaking into my house and going through me to do it, and I have a samurai sword... I have no moral qualms with stabbing the guy.

How about killing him though? That seems to be the issue.

Black Barney wrote:

screamingtruth wrote:

I have a kid. If some guy acts like he's planning on breaking into my house and going through me to do it, and I have a samurai sword... I have no moral qualms with stabbing the guy.

How about killing him though? That seems to be the issue.

I wouldn't kill him with a sword. I'd incapacitate him with it long enough to get him into the wood chipper.

lol, good plan.

Although while you're at it, you might as well have a quick go with him in the bum